Christmas is right around the corner and Jennifer Nettles and friends are getting the holiday started early with special performances on a CMA Country Christmas, airing Nov. 28 on ABC.
Jennifer returns for the seventh consecutive year as host of the holiday special, sharing the stage to recreate collaborations from her Christmas album—To Celebrate Christmas—including “Little Drummer Boy” with Idina Menzel and “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” with R&B singer Andra Day and a one-of-a-kind collaboration with Trisha Yearwood and Loretta Lynn.
“I love it. I’ve loved it from the beginning though, being able to celebrate the holidays and essentially country music is paying host to good holiday music across the board, across genres,” said Jennifer. “We host the music, we host the artists that are putting out Christmas records that year or whoever wants to come and celebrate wonderful holiday music.”
Recorded at the Grand Ole Opry House in Nashville, the holiday special features performances by Kelsea Ballerini, Joey Alexander, Chris Young, Brad Paisley, Kelly Clarkson, Brett Eldredge, Amy Grant, Sarah McLachlan, Kacey Musgraves, Rascal Flatts and Jordan Smith.
Brett Eldredge, who has his own Christmas album out, Glow, will be performing two cuts from the album, “Let It Snow” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”
“They are two of my favorite songs from the album,” said Brett about his choice of songs. “It’s so hard to pick 12 songs for an album but to actually perform these songs, I get to pick two, they are so much fun. “Let It Snow” has so much energy—we are early on in the show to bring energy to the crowd and fire them up.”
CMA Country Christmas is set to air Nov. 28 at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. Check out the photo gallery from the show.